Posts Tagged ‘Catherine Ashton’

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu declared that negotiating with Hamas means nothing except how to commit suicide, and Hamas proved his point this morning with another “cease-fire” rocket explosion that was heard by Gaza Belt residents but denied by the IDF.

He said in an interview to be aired Sunday by CNN, “As long as Hamas remains committed to our destruction, what’s there to negotiate with? The method of my suicide or what?”

The Jewish Press reported here earlier this morning that a rocket was launched but did not land in Israel, prompting the IDF to declare it was a “false alarm” and leading the public to think that there was no rocket launch. IDF spokesmen insisted there was no rocket fire, but residents in the Gaza Belt reported they heard an explosion.

The military’s definition of a “false alarm” is a bit fuzzy.

Spokesman told The Jewish Press Sunday, “The term means that an alarm was activated, though without any launch from Gaza. It is important for me to emphasize that each incident is a case of its own and any more information about a ‘false alarm’ is not connected to the use of the term itself.”

In clearer language, “false alarm” means there was no rocket launch – unless there was a rocket launch.

Nearly half a dozen rockets have been launched since the end of the recent cease-fire, and all of them fell in Gaza or in the sea. Several times, the IDF confirmed the launch along with stating that the Color Red siren was a”false alarm.” It appears the IDF spokesmen’s response depends on the political atmosphere.

The last cease-fire may or may remain the last one in a war that was escalated in 2005, immediately after the Sharon government expelled all Jews and withdrew all IDF personnel from to ensure safety for southern Israel.

In return, Hamas placed all of Israel within range of missile attacks until the temporary “cease-fire” two months ago that was to be followed by negotiations for a long-term halt in violence.

No one, except for perhaps Catherine Ashton and John Kerry, believes that will ever happen. Israel’s demand that Hamas dis arm makes great headlines for the vast majority of Israeli who are fed up with Hamas’ countless cease-fires that have proven to be nothing more than an opportunity for its terrorists to prepare to attack deeper into Israel in the next round.

Whether Hamas is testing rockets or simply is trying to prove its point that it can attack Israel if it wants, Sunday morning’s launch is a reminder that the cease-fire will last only as Hamas does not see any political, diplomatic or military gain in attacking again and suffering a devastating response from the IDF.

A stronger but less vocal reminder is Hamas’ continued attempts to smuggle by sea material for manufacturing weapons.

The Israeli Navy has foiled several maritime smuggling attempts in August, according to a Navy commander quoted by The Jerusalem Post Sunday. He told the newspaper, “We continue to see attempts to smuggle weapons or material to build them. The sea is a very convenient platform for smuggling. The terrorists still have one big smuggling tunnel, and it’s called the Mediterranean.”

An IDF Intelligence Unit Lieutenant Colonel told the Times of Israel, “Hamas will not relinquish its military capabilities or its military wing. The demand that it subordinate its military wing to the PA is unrealizable. For now, the talk of ‘one weapon,’ or ‘one authority’ is just talk.”

There is a major moral distinction that needs to be taken into account when one considers the murders of Israeli teens Eyal Yifrach, Gilad Shaar, and Naftali Frankel and the murder of Palestinian teen Muhammad Abu Khdeir.

The difference is that the Palestinian Authority has embraced such mass murderers as heroes and Israel punishes all murderers, whether they murder Arabs or Jews.

A Palestinian Arab terrorist who murders Israelis knows he may well have streets named after him and that Palestinian Arab children will be taught to emulate him.

In Israel, by contrast, all murderers are condemned across the board, and are severely punished.

The failure of the world to understand this distinction is exacerbating the conflict.

The problem today is that the support for and embrace of mass murderers of Jews is led by the head of the PA, Mahmoud Abbas, and yet world leaders are silent.

Abbas was a leading terrorist for decades; Abu Daoud, one of the terrorists involved in the Munich Olympics massacre, wrote about how Abbas financed it. When Daoud recently died, Abbas eulogized him as a hero.

It took Abbas five days to condemn the kidnapping of Eyal, Gilad and Naftali, and world leaders were quick to praise him for it even though he never called for the perpetrators to be brought to justice.

Moreover, we know that should Israel capture the Palestinian murderers of the three teens, Abbas will call for their release, as he has repeatedly called for the release of all Palestinian mass murderers from Israeli jails, including those who murdered most of the Fogel family.

Even worse, the PA takes American aid and uses it to give incentive money to the families of terrorists serving sentences in Israeli jails. This is the case even when the victims are Americans.

The murderers of Eyal, Gilad and Naftali were captured on tape celebrating the murders; their identities are known, and yet the world is slow to accept that Hamas is responsible.

The EU’s Catherine Ashton took almost a week to condemn the kidnapping. But when Muhammad Abu Khdeir was murdered, her immediate condemnation was forthcoming. Ashton’s actions have not gone unnoticed by world Jewry.

There is a famous and truthful saying that if Israel disarmed tomorrow it would be eradicated by the Palestinian Arabs, while if the Palestinian Arabs disarmed tomorrow they would lose no land and live happy, peaceful lives.

When missiles are fired from Gaza indiscriminately at civilians there is no outrage. Israel rightfully tries to protect its people by attacking the missile sites – and then we hear about “stopping the cycle of violence” and “restraint.” This has been the world’s consistent, and morally bankrupt, response.

Only if the world stands up for the moral position that Israel has the right to do what is necessary to defend its citizens, and ends the calls for restraint, will things change.

Consider: Would someone have dared call on the United States to “end the cycle of violence” between it and al Qaeda?

Israel is literally fighting for its life, fighting to sustain itself as one state hopefully at peace. It needs to have the freedom to do what is necessary to guarantee that security. All other countries in the world have such freedom. It is the world’s failure to condemn the PA’s embrace and rewarding of murderers of Jews that contributes so much to the seemingly intractable Arab-Israeli conflict.

America’s moral justification for attacking not just al Qaeda but also Afghanistan after September 11, 2001, was based on the argument that those who give safe haven to terrorists are as responsible as the terrorists, and that therefore the Taliban could be attacked for giving safe haven to al Qaeda.

European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who dragged her heels interminably on issuing a condemnation when three Israeli teens were kidnapped by Arab terrorists 19 days ago in Gush Etzion, hurried to condemn their murders after their bodies were found together in a field located in Halhul, an Arab village smack in the middle of the Palestinian Authority.

The connection was inescapable – this crime was committed by Palestinian Authority Arab terrorists, with the cooperation and collaboration of PA Arab villagers.

“We learned with profound sorrow that the bodies of the three Israeli youths who were kidnapped on 12 June in the West Bank were found on 30 June near Hebron,” read the statement released by Ashton’s representative on Tuesday. “We condemn in the strongest terms their killing. We express our sincere condolences to their families and friends and share their grief. We trust the perpetrators of this barbaric act will swiftly be brought to justice.”

Nevertheless, Ashton could not stop herself from reminding Israel to exercise caution when dealing with the PA.

“We call for restraint of all parties concerned in order not to further aggravate the fragile situation on the ground,” the statement concluded.

European Union (EU) foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton has announced she will end her term at the end of December this year.

In a speech earlier this week, Ashton — who often has faced a flood of negative press for her actions — appeared to express relief that her time in office at the EU was over at last.

In sharing the news at a meeting of the German Marshall Fund earlier this week, Ashton remarked, “you lay the foundations but there are people who can do things with this that probably I couldn’t do, so it will be good to hand it over.”

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, who has led the European Council since November 2009, also said he would step down. Van Rompuy said he would retire from politics.

Ashton’s place in history will be marked by her founding the anti-Israel European External Action Service (EEAS), a body the Lisbon Treaty allegedly ensures is independent from other institutions. However, it is headed by the European Commission vice president, which calls into question the entity’s autonomous status.

Three hundred and thirty two drone attacks against Al Qaida and Taliban targets on Pakistani territory since 2005 demonstrate U.S. President Barack Obama’s strong resolve against terrorists that threaten the United States. Only last week, the latest wave of air strikes launched or enabled by his government against Al Qaida networks in Yemen killed 55 suspected extremists, possibly including master bomb-maker Ibrahim al-Asiri.

Of course no one expects the U.S. to send drones in reply to the news that the Palestinian Authority [PA], upon which he has lavished billions of dollars and thousands of hours of diplomacy, was going into business with Hamas, which the United States has branded a terrorist organization.

But one could hope for something more forceful from Washington than State Department spokesman Jen Psaki’s weak and vacillating response in which she attempted to take the heat off Hamas and the PA by taking a gratuitous dig at Israel. “There have been unhelpful steps from both sides throughout this process,” she said.

If the US response was feeble, the EU’s was treacherous.

Like America and several other countries, the EU designates Hamas as a terrorist organization. Yet the spokesman for Catherine Ashton, EU foreign affairs head, actually welcomed the proposal to bring Hamas into the PA.

Though shameful, this is far from surprising. It is part of a lengthy pattern of witting or unwitting EU encouragement of Middle Eastern terrorism.

The EU has contributed its taxpayers’ money to paying the salaries of convicted Palestinian terrorists via unconditional donations to the PA amounting to billions of dollars since 1994. Some of this money has also been spent on school textbooks, television programs and other PA propaganda that incite hatred and terrorism against Israel.

Ashton and the EU have called repeatedly for an end to the Israeli-Egyptian security operation on land and sea around Gaza. The operation is designed to prevent predominantly Iranian-supplied munitions and materiel for terrorism from entering the Gaza Strip, and to stop Gaza terrorists and weapons moving to attack Israeli or Egyptian targets.

At the same time, the EU, like the UN, has usually remained mute in the face of volley after volley of Iranian-supported rocket attacks from Gaza directed against the civilian population of Israel. These rockets are fired mainly by Hamas and their terrorist bedfellows, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Silence and inaction by such significant international bodies as the UN and the EU must, in these circumstances, add up to at least a degree of culpability.

Robert Serry, the UN Special Coordinator for the Peace Process, seems to have swallowed Abbas’s suggestion to him that reconciliation with Hamas will be on the basis of “recognition of Israel, non-violence and adherence to previous agreements.” On that “understanding,” the UN, like the EU, apparently welcomes and even supports the prospect of a terrorist group’s incorporation into the PA.

Were Hamas indeed to commit — plausibly — to such undertakings, then Israel could of course continue peace negotiations and cooperation with the PA on current terms. But other than Abbas’s words to Serry, there is no indication of this and, in the real world, Hamas is not likely even to consider such conditions.

Prime Minister Netanyahu therefore had no choice other than to suspend the peace process. This was his obligation to the Israeli people and to the international community. How could he possibly continue to negotiate with an entity that is itself negotiating with a vicious, murderous and unrelenting terrorist group hell-bent on the destruction of Israel and outlawed around the world?

Of course Abbas knew full well when he agreed to unity with Hamas that this would end the peace negotiations. But this is only the latest in a series of steps that Abbas has taken to sabotage the peace process. He rejected U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s framework principles last month; he has repeatedly refused to discuss PA recognition of Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish people; and at the end of March he initiated a move to join 15 international organizations, contravening an agreement to make no unilateral moves in the international arena during the period of the peace negotiations.

Catherine Ashton, the EU’s highest ranking foreign policy official, blessed the proposed joining of Hamas and Fatah. The US and the EU transfer millions of dollars to the Palestinian Authority which gives these same monies into the pockets of incarcerated Palestinian terrorists. Many of those same terrorists – who committed heinous crimes, admitted to those crimes, and take great pride in their actions – are called heroes and are released by Israel by the bushel. So it should come as no surprise that we have reached a new low in the fight against terror: blame the victim.

Lord Norman Lamont, a former British Chancellor of the Exchequer, has written yesterday in the NY Post that pending litigation against Arab Bank, the largest financial institution in the Middle East, is all about making lawyers rich and not bringing justice to terror victim families. In his words:

Can American trial lawyers use US courts to legally blackmail foreign banks? The US Solicitor General — to whom the Supreme Court has turned for advice — is now considering whether the justices should hear a case (Arab Bank v. Linde) about just that.

In 2004, American trial lawyers sued one of the Middle East’s oldest financial institutions, the Jordan-based Arab Bank, on behalf of US victims of terror attacks within Israel and their families.

The civil suit claims the bank knowingly did business with terrorists and terror-linked charities, becoming a conduit for funds financing terrorist strikes. The charge is unlikely, to put it mildly. Arab Bank has a long history of working with Israel. After the signing of the Oslo Accords, Israel used the bank to transfer tax revenues it had collected for the Palestinian Authority. During the intifada, it depended on the bank to act as a financial intermediary for western aid to the territories.

Lord Lamont apparently was not fully briefed about the case against Arab Bank.

The Bank has been forced to admit that it serviced accounts of terror-associated organizations marked as such by the US government. They could not explain away the existence of the accounts, the association between these accounts and US-designated terror groups, or the Bank’s providing financial services for those same accounts.

The bank’s New York branch was shut down by the US Treasury and Arab Bank paid a $24 million fine for its “systematic” failures to follow US anti-money laundering procedures.

The bank’s role in serving terrorists was identified when the lead lawyer in the first lawsuit against the bank identified online Saudi appeals for deposits into Palestinian “martyr” accounts held and serviced by Arab Bank.

The bank’s only claim is that it was unaware that it was helping terrorists.

Yasser Arafat also had a history of “working with Israel.” This fact did not stand in the way of his documented active involvement in incitement and terror against Jewish targets.

As a terror victim represented in the Linde v. Arab Bank litigation, I can only praise the conduct of the lawyers on our case. They have worked for ten years against powerful law firms representing the bank, and they have never taken a penny from us for their thousands of hours of travel, court appearances, depositions, and research.

And that research has shown a pattern of servicing accounts associated with Palestinian terror organizations. It would not be a stretch to say that the Second Intifada—with over 1,100 Israelis killed—would have been impossible without some form of financial infrastructure for supporting guerrilla war against Israel and its citizens.

The bank was sanctioned by Judge Nina Gershon after repeatedly failing to provide critical documents related to the bank’s actions in facilitating the movement of funds in bank accounts identified by our lawyers. Hiding Palestinian Authority bank secrecy laws did not cut it with Judge Gershon or with the Second Circuit Court of Appeals which ruled 3-0 to keep the sanctions in place. And it would appear that the author of this calumnious article is directing it solely at the Solicitor General, who is charged with informing the Supreme Court on the government’s view of the sanctions in the case.

This report is a gift from God. While our dubious representatives at the negotiations with the PLO are running around like chickens sand the heads warning about the terrible things that would happen to us if we’re dropped from the EU list of good Jews you can trade with – it’s looking like the entire EU itself is up for a major reupholstering, and maybe, just maybe, some of the folks making the loudest threats will see the inside of a barred cell.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it appears the European Union, the one with the charter on what’s legal and decent, is one of the most corrupt organizations on the planet.

There, I said it.

How corrupt id the European Union? Cecilia Malmstrom, the European commissioner for home affairs, says it’s losing at least 120 billion euros a year to corruption.

The EU Anti-Corruption Report warns that “Corruption seriously harms the economy and society as a whole. Many countries around the world suffer from deep-rooted corruption that hampers economic development, undermines democracy, and damages social justice and the rule of law. The Member States of the EU are not immune to this reality.”

Malmstrom said the commission’s estimate that corruption costs Europe €120 billion, or roughly $162 billion, annually was almost certainly too conservative. The figure is equivalent to about 1 percent of the €11.7 trillion gross domestic product of the 28-nation European Union.

Are you not surprised? Me neither. The intro to the report continues: “Corruption varies in nature and extent from one country to another, but it affects all Member States. It impinges on good governance, sound management of public money, and competitive markets. In extreme cases, it undermines the trust of citizens in democratic institutions and processes.”

You know what this means, right? It means that every decision, every effort, every suggestion coming out of the EU is suspected of having a hidden agenda, and a nefarious one at that.

Do you want these people helping us strike a peace deal with our neighbors?

Most Businesses believe EU corruption is widespread and that the only way to succeed in business is through political connections and almost half of the companies doing business in Europe say corruption is a problem for them.

“In a time of appalling economic and financial crisis, recovering for the legal economy the money deviated by defrauders is of utmost importance; those funds are very much needed to foster growth and jobs,” said Spain’s Juan Fernando López Aguilar, who chairs the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Committee.

Someone should tell Aguilar that almost all firms in Greece, Spain and Italy believe corruption is widespread.

Construction companies, which often tender for government contracts, are the most affected. Almost eight in ten of those questioned had complaints about corruption. The NY Times reported that a 2013 study for European Union anti-fraud authorities described a case in which an unnamed government entity invited companies to bid on a contract to build two buildings. The winning bid was €600,000, even though other companies had offered to do the work for €400,000.

Somebody pocketed that €200,000.

So, I say, don’t buy stuff from these people, you just don’t know where it’s been. Boycott the European Union because they’re gonnifs.

The key findings at European level are:

The majority (76%) of Europeans think that corruption is widespread in their own country.

Countries where respondents are most likely to think so are: Greece (99%), Italy (97%), Lithuania, Spain and the Czech Republic (all 95%), Croatia (94%), Romania (93%), Slovenia (91%), Portugal and Slovakia (both 90%). The Nordic countries are the only Member States where the majority think corruption is rare – Denmark (75%), Finland (64%) and Sweden (54%).

More than half of Europeans (56%) think the level of corruption in their country has increased over the past three years (a surge compared to a previous study in 2011, when 47% perceived corruption to have risen over the same period of time).

Spain (77%), Slovenia, the Czech Republic (both 76%), Italy (74%) and Portugal (72%) are amongst countries where respondents are most likely to think corruption has increased.

23% of Europeans think that their government’s efforts are effective in tackling corruption; 26% that there are enough successful prosecutions in their country to deter people from corrupt practices.

81% of Europeans think that too-close links between business and politics in their country lead to corruption; 69% that favouritism and corruption hinder business competition; 67% that corruption is part of the business culture in their country; and more than half (56%) that the only way to succeed in business in their country is through political connections.

Around one in twelve Europeans (8%) say they have experienced or witnessed a case of corruption in the past 12 months. Yet only 12% of those who have encountered corruption say that they reported it.

Respondents are most likely to say they have experienced or witnessed corruption in Lithuania (25 %), Slovakia (21 %) and Poland (16 %) and least likely to do so in Finland and Denmark (3 % in each), Malta and the UK (4 % in each).